February 11, 2009

At Peace With Punctuation

Today I reviewed compound sentences with my middle school students. Shhhh. Don't tell anyone, that I am such a freak, but I really enjoyed it. I am impressed with how much most of them know, so it's not painful at all. Sure, I had to do one-on-one with a few, but even that proved to be fairly painless. It was even fun.

Fun? Over the years, I have come to terms with sentence structures instruction for the purpose of teaching where to put commas in sentences. I have a 2-inch thick folder with various handouts and practice papers I've used with different groups over the years. When I tell the students that I could on for days about clauses and sentences, I'm not really kidding...

So I'm a nerd. I like grammar. Why? I think it's because sometimes it's so tiring being a hippy-dippy English teacher. Sometimes having flexibility and options takes a toll on my brain. In so many aspects of what and how I teach, there are multiple answers. With grammar and mechanics instruction, there is one way.

It's the rule.

Simple.

(Yes, I know that "one way" is not always accurate, but a lot of the time it is!)